After the outbreak of the First World War, Australia and New Zealand formed the Anzac Army, followed the British army to land on the Gallipoli Peninsula of the Ottoman Empire, the famous Battle of Gallipoli broke out, but the outcome of this war was unexpected, under the fierce resistance of the Ottoman army, the British army began to retreat, and the accompanying Anzac Army also suffered heavy losses.
At that time, there were seven divisions in the Anzac Army, five of which were formed by Australians, and the Chinese sniper Shen Billy, who is introduced below, was from the Fifth Light Cavalry Regiment under the Anzac Army.
Billy Shen
Born in 1886 in Kundus, Australia, his father was a vegetable farmer in Shanghai, and later came to Australia because of his livelihood, and met Shen Billy's mother, Maria, and Shen Billy's early years had been living in a mining town in central Kunduz, when Australia was very deserted and there were not many colleges and universities, so Shen Billy had to drop out of school and go home when he was a teenager.
After dropping out of school, Shen Billy began to help the family farm, during this period, Shen Billy was madly obsessed with hunting, often with some partners in the grass of his hometown kangaroos, this entertainment activity let Shen Billy first contact with guns, and his amazing talent also showed during that period, he practiced a hundred shots of marksmanship, once broke the tail of a pig twenty meters away.
After the outbreak of the First World War, the then twenty-eight-year-old Shen Billy joined the Australian Expeditionary Force, he followed the Fifth Light Cavalry Regiment to the European battlefield, after joining the army, Shen Billy's excellent marksmanship was displayed, in the Gallipoli battlefield, one Ottoman soldier after another fell under his gun muzzle, and the comrades also gave Shen Billy a nickname called "Gallipoli's Killer".
In order to be able to deal with Shen Billy, the Ottoman army sent the ace sniper Abdul, a Turkish sniper who was once called the terrible Abdul by the Allied soldiers for his excellent marksmanship, but Abdul was killed in a duel with Shen Billy, and Shen Billy shot Abdul in the eyebrow.
According to shen billy's comrades-in-arms, Shen Billy's eyesight is very good, others can see things with the naked eye with the glasses, and he only uses an ordinary standard rifle, and never equipped with a scope, because he is very confident in his vision.
Statue in honor of Shen Billy
For his outstanding performance in the Battle of Gallipoli, Shen Billy received many military medals, and in October 1915, a general named Birdwood, in his commendation, confirmed that Shen Billy had killed at least 201 enemy troops on the battlefield.
Shen Billy retired from the army two weeks after the end of the First World War, he returned to his hometown of Kunduz, and did not live a decent life because he was a war hero, it is said that there were about four hundred Chinese soldiers who participated with him in the Australian Expeditionary Force, but these people did not enjoy the aura of heroes after returning to China, perhaps because of their Chinese background, so that the locals did not pay attention to publicizing their deeds, and Shen Billy died in a cheap hotel in 1943. He had only five shillings in cash.